D&D General 6-8 encounters (combat?)

[UngainlyTitan]

@Maxperson, @UngainlyTitan, @Fanaelialae, @Micah Sweet, @Flamestrike, @FrozenNorth, etal.

Can a compromise be helpful? I am probably ok with:

• A Downtime of at least a week of rest automatically counts as a long rest.
• During an adventure, all rests are short rests.
• Twice before the next level, a player can change one short rest into a long rest.

This ability to switch a short rest satisfies my need for narrative flexibility to be able to tell different kinds of adventure stories, when combats happen at different frequencies, whether covert ops surprise-attacking room to room or pirates sailing the open seas.

When characters end an adventure and go into Downtime, they automatically refresh: even if they used up their long rests and havent leveled up yet. A minimum of a week of rest defines a Downtime, to ensure the flavor that the players are definitely not adventuring. (Also, a brief google found that eight days is the average amount of ideal vacationing for the purpose of relaxing from work. So about a week Monday to Monday off, makes sense.)

There are still ambiguous corner cases. In my campaigns, players normally do social encounters during Downtime, relevant to the various ambitions they are working toward. So it is possible to level up during Downtime. This shouldnt be a problem.

More awkwardly, a seafaring campaign might sail for months. Encounters might be weeks apart. So whether a sailor on a vessel is in an adventure or in a Downtime is ambiguous. Maybe, if the player hasnt seen combat action for a week, the journey can start counting as a downtime? Then the second week is a week of Downtime that automatically counts as a longrest? Like I said, awkward.

Anyway, the extensive timeframe of journeys can be handled separately. The point is, a Downtime automatically refreshes regardless of leveling. Meanwhile, adventures have to long rests per level and the player decides when these two happen.

You do you, I would not be keen on two long rest per level. It is levelling too fast for my taste but what ever. I do not really have an issue with rests I am just trying to understand the position of others here.

 

[Minigiant]

And for the other 50 percent, half of them are shorter days with fewer encounters, and half of them are longer with more (or have more short rests).

Get it yet? Overall balance is maintained. Some days the casters get to shine (they're long rest based) and some days the Fighters will (they're short rest based). The spotlight moves around.

YOU DONT HAVE TO HAVE EVERY DAY FEATURE 6-8 ENCOUNTERS AND 2-3 SHORT RESTS AND NOONE IS SAYING YOU DO.

I've said that several times now, so please PLEASE stop arguing against strawmen that no-one is actually saying.

You missed my first premise that a 6-8 encounter day is too long. Having 50% of your days in 16 hour doom clocks feels too obviously contrived to me and my players.

 

[FrozenNorth]

And for the other 50 percent, half of them are shorter days with fewer encounters, and half of them are longer with more (or have more short rests).

Part of the issue is what is required on the DM to create those longer days.

It is trivially easy to make a short adventuring day. It is in fact less work than a standard adventuring day.

What about a longer adventuring day? It isn’t just about (1) creating 12 different fun, interesting combat encounters; (2) making the situation sufficiently urgent to justify not taking a long rest, but sufficiently flexible that multiple short rests are available; (3) narratively justifying 12 combats. (at high levels, this gets kind of ridiculous); and (4) verifying that there aren’t any magical ways to just skip half the fights.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

The post chain deal with the position that the 5MWD was fine. If you are talking to the players to stop the 5MWD, then how is it not a problem? Resting after every fight IS the 5MWD.

Iam not talking to any players. It is not a problem I have at the table. I was trying to understand your position. Which I believe I do now.

The 5MWD is as old as D&D. It just wasn't using that term back then. Use up all your resources and rest so the wizard and cleric could get spells back was very common back in the day.

Yes, I am aware of this. It did not bother me then either.

 

[Flamestrike]

I'm sure that it's been discussed already but the not at all "gritty" gritty rest variant introduces it's own set of problems that the gm is left to fix.. If it were as simple as people not seeing it often suggest that fixing it is then we wouldn't be seeing these discussions eight years in.

Then come up with your own resting rules to fix it!

All i hear from you is 'I dont wanna use Doom clocks' and 'None of the published variants work for me'.

You're the DM. Create one that does work for you. It's up to you to maintain it.

 

[Mort]

Mort you've played through one of my high level adventures where I stuck loosely to the 6 or so encounter/ 2 short rest paradigm.

What were your observations re class balance?

If the 6-8 encounters (or equivalent) is maintained then balance, in combat, will "balance" out. As you say, doom clocks and other time pressure is the DMs friend here.

As a matter of fact, I was a bit surprised just how well, in a high level set of scenarios, the fighter performed, in combat. It fully solidified my view that, in combat, fighters aren't just fine - the can excell.

Some items, like the staff of the magi, are problematic here - they give casters significantly more resources to devote EVERY adventuring day.

I'd still like for more options for fighters in the pillars outside of combat - LevelUp and some other 3rd party stuff has some answers here.

 

[FrozenNorth]

Then come up with your own resting rules to fix it!

All i hear from you is 'I dont wanna use Doom clocks' and 'None of the published variants work for me'.

You're the DM. Create one that does work for you. It's up to you to maintain it.

Isn’t that the Oberoni fallacy? It isn’t a problem if the DM can fix it?

 

[Flamestrike]

You missed my first premise that a 6-8 encounter day is too long. Having 50% of your days in 16 hour doom clocks feels too obviously contrived to me and my players.

Who says they need to be 16 hours?

There are a billion ways to do a doom clock that isnt 'get it done in the next 24 hours or else'.

Heck, you could have a non specific Doom clock to hurry the party up:

1) A rival group of powerful adventurers are also asking about the dungeon. Can you clear it and recover the loot before they get there and claim it for themselves?
2) The High priest has been abducted. The Lizardfolk plan to eat him. Can you rescue him before this happens?
3) There is a terrible plague sweeping the land. Can you recover the ingredients before the plague wipes out the town in order to claim your reward (4d6 townfolk die each day, and when the number reaches 50, the PCs dont get paid).

Etc etc etc etc.

 

[Fanaelialae]

The 5MWD is as old as D&D. It just wasn't using that term back then. Use up all your resources and rest so the wizard and cleric could get spells back was very common back in the day.

Although there were disincentives at higher levels, since re-memorizing high level spells took at long time. You could realistically end up wasting an entire day on it.

Not that that stopped us. Though for us it was always because we'd taken too much damage and the cleric was out of healing magic. So we'd wait a day or two for the cleric to heal the party up, since natural healing was at a glacial pace.

I can't actually recall a 5MWD prior to 3e that was due to the wizard. Nor even really the cleric, except when they ran out of healing spells. I'm not saying it didn't happen at other tables, just not at mine (as far as I can recollect).

 

[Maxperson]

I find the offical rest variants − especially week=long and sleep=short − to be equally inflexible narratively.

That is why I count two long rests per level − so they can happen whenever. Sometimes the long rest happens during a sleep. Sometimes the long rest happens after a week of rest and recuperation. Sometimes the long rest happens when the character takes a moment to gather ones wits in the face of a dangerous challenge that one is about to face. A long rest can happen during any one of these kinds of rests.

Then whatever the adventure story is describes the context of when these moments of becoming fully refreshed happen.

What do you do if both long rests end up being used and they still have 3/4 of the level to go?